by Dean Koontz
"What did it? What exploded?"
"One of our weapons," Hulann said. "Although it was not quite what you would call an 'explosion'."
Leo stepped closer to the crater and cocked his head, pushed his long, blond hair away from his ears. "What's that noise?"
There was a faint hissing noise, now and then a grumble like the first stirrings of a volcano.
"That's part of it," Hulann said. "It wasn't a bomb really. Not as you're thinking of a bomb. All along your ' Great Lakes, there was, at the start of the war, a vast complex of factories, robo-factories producing the vast quantities of materials needed to wage a galactic battle. Not only was ore mined from your own world, but brought from your moon, from the asteroid belts of your solar system. It was a formidable complex. The easiest way to wipe it out was to drop a few conversion cannisters on it."
"I don't understand," Leo said. "We weren't told the Lake production centers had been hit."
"Only seven years ago. It was the final blow. Otherwise, the planet would have held us off incredibly long."
"You said 'conversion cannisters'?"
The constant sheet of green fires that played across the crater from rim, up and down, zig-zagging, puffing like balls of burning gas, now flashed through with a faint streak of purple that caught their attention and held it for some minutes.
"Conversion cannisters," Hulann continued, "contain one of the most virulent bacterial lifeforms in the known universe. The bacteria are capable of attacking certain forms of matter and converting them to energy. In the labs, various strains have been developed, some of which will attack only fixed nitrogen, others which will convert only iron, others for calcium, lead, on and on for as many elements and types of elements as there are."
"The hissing—"
"Is the conversion of matter taking place. The variety of strains included in the cannisters dropped here during attack, only the elements in your chief building supplies —and in the average sample of your topsoil for this area of the earth. The bacteria will convert everything in its path, convert it to a slowly-leaked form of energy rather than explosions of the atomic sort, down until it hits bedrock which it is not equipped to devour, and onward until it reaches water or some other 'indigestible' barrier."
"And the green light is the only result?" Leo asked, stepping back as the edge of the pit came almost imperceptibly closer.
"No. The green light energy is what we can see. Above your range of audio reception—even above mine —there is a great deal of sound energy generated. Also, there is an enormous amount of energy consumed by the bacteria themselves to enable them to continue their conversions and to reproduce at the rate the lab men set for them."
"And it'll go on until there's nothing left?"
"No. We don't want to destroy a world. Within a few days, a special naoli team will arrive to begin antibacterial work to halt the progress of the crater and destroy the mites."
"But the air will carry them," Leo protested.
"No. Such catastrophes have been guarded against. The bacteria are designed to anchor themselves to whatever elemental molecules they are bred to attack. Thus, a wind would have to blow away the entire linkage of ferrous trace elements in an area to also spread the iron-eating bacteria. And if a bacteria cannot find, within moments, any of its particular 'tropic' substance to latch on to, it dies. There are all sorts of built-in protections."
"Why not a series of nuclears to wipe out the Lake complex?"
Hulann shook his head. "Nuclears cannot damage well-shielded underground establishments. The bacteria can—by dissolving the earth that covers them, then converting the very structural materials of the installations."
They watched the pit, the shimmering, glimmering flames. Faint heat waves rolled over them and kept the snow melted around the perimeter of the hole. If they strained their ears, they could hear the sound of the energy of conversion being released far up the scale of vibrations.
"We didn't really have a chance against you," Leo said at last.
Green erupted, staining their faces.
"No," Hulann agreed.
Leo went back to the car. Hulann followed.
"Will it still fly?" Leo asked.
Hulann bent and inspected the bottom of the craft. There was almost nothing remaining of the heavy rubber cushion rim. The metal frame was bent and ripped, but not so severely that it would push in against the blades in the recessed undercarriage. If there still were any blades under there. He looked back on the snowy highway but could not see any large dark objects that might be shafts or rotars.
"Let's see," he said.
The engine coughed, but turned over. They rose on the wind of the blades, though there was a steady vibration that gently rattled the frame. "Well, it runs," Hulann said. "But where do we go from here? The road ends, as you see."
"Over the median," Leo said. "On back to the next exit. We'll just have to take secondary roads until we're past the crater and can get back on the good beater surface of the throughway."
Hulann took the shuttlecraft over the concrete bump in the center of the highway, wheeled the craft around and started back, looking for a way off the useless expressway—a way that would take them west where they wished to go.
The Hunter will soon be awakened.
The Hunter will rise up in his glory and take upon him the robes of his power.
The Hunter will seek.
Before, there has always been success.
The Hunter was born to hunt, as his prey was born to be brought down at his desire . . .
They made much poorer time on the secondary roads than they had on the highways where the beater surface was solid and flat. Here, the pavement had been originally designed for wheeled vehicles, which made it far too uneven and twisted to offer much to a shuttlecraft. Besides, they were moving into the mountains near' the end of the Pennsylvania line where the weather, if anything, was more fierce than before.
The wind had picked up a few notches, battered the already beaten craft until the shuddering of the wounded mechanical beast grew severe enough to shatter one of the two round ports on the rear, behind the luggage shelf. Glass imploded, spun throughout the cabin. A piece of it caught Leo on the cheek, drew blood. Other pieces stuck in Hulann's flesh but not deep enough to cause him pain or to make him bleed.
Hulann maintained a low blade revolution count in order to hug the road and avoid the draughts that were much stronger even a few feet farther up. Sudden rises in the pavement gave them hair-raising moments as Hulann fought to go around them—or increase the rotar speed and go over them—to keep from sheering off the blades.
Then there was the snow. There seemed to be half a dozen inches of it now, and the steadiness with which it fell indicated no soon end to the storm. The biting wind —now whistling and howling through the shattered rear port and leeching out their cabin heat—piled the white stuff into every nook and crevice, stacked it against every outcropping of stone, layer on layer until it backed up across the highway, thick, cold fingers packing hard and making progress on air cushion even more difficult. Un-drifted snow was light and flushed away under the blades. But the wind-packed stuff was solid as ice, would not blow away, and gave Hulann trouble with his machine.
"How much can it snow here?" he asked Leo as they flitted up the side of a mountain which should have been tunneled through. He was amazed at the impracticality.
"Maybe a foot. Two feet is not unusual."
"Two feet!"
"Like you and me."
"That's impossible!"
"You don't have snow on your world?"
"Not that much!"
"Wait," the boy said, smiling.
He waited.
The snow continued. Mounted. Blew. Drifted. The shuttlecraft slowed and slowed until he could not drop their forward speed any further. It was maddening to realize there were forces behind which would soon be after them and that they could only crawl along at under ten miles an hour. The only co
nsolation Hulann could find was the realization that those chasing them would also have to move slowly. Then that consolation was ruined too. The Hunter—would the Hunter be turned loose on them? It seemed likely although the situation would be unique—would wait until the storm had ended, then come by air, in a helicopter.
They rounded a bend in the road near the top of the mountain, were confronted by a wall of packed snow four feet high, stretching across from the road bank of their right to the precipice on their left. Hulann braked, but not fast enough. The shuttlecraft bumped into the drift at seven miles an hour and wedged the first few feet of itself into the smooth, wind-polished whiteness.
"Stuck," Leo said knowledgeably.
"We have nothing to dig with. I'll have to manuever."
Leo braced himself, feet against the dash, back pressed into the seat. Hulann laughed. "Ready," Leo said.
Hulann fed power to the blades, and kicked the side jets into reverse, The craft lurched but held fast. He eased down on the accelerator until it was almost floored. The blades chewed at the snow that packed the front section of them, seemed only to lodge themselves more firmly.
He eased off on the pedal until the blades whirred softly, then tramped it down hard. The shuttle started like an animal, wiggled. He eased up, slammed down again. The craft jolted free and swept backwards, sliding sideways toward the guardrails and the long, deadly embankment.
Hulann let up on the pedal, but too quickly as ...
. . . the engine died and the blades choked and he no longer had control of his machine . . .
They struck the rails, tilted, went over.
The car hung there, caught on some projection, teetering. Then it fell.
Glass shattered.
And they were rolling down, down . . .
Chapter Five
It was a hundred and five minutes before dawn of that day.
In the city that had once been called Atlanta when there were men to make with names, one of the few human metropolises not destroyed by its owners in the last convulsions of their defeat, Sara Laramie moved through the iron castings in the foundry yard, keeping low so that she was at all times concealed from view on at least three sides. The Hunter Relemar was in pursuit of her, had been for some days. She did not know that he was called a Hunter by his kind or that his name was Relemar. It was obvious, however, that he was different from other naoli.
He moved quietly, stealthily, like a wraith. She had watched him prowl a street from a vantage point on the roof of a department store. At times, she had even lost sight of him, though there was damned little he could hide behind in an open avenue. She had been glad she was not down there, running. She saw, for the first time, why she had not been able to lose him before this. He was not a naoli. Not really.
He was something else. Something more.
A special breed of animal.
While she had been watching, he suddenly turned and scanned the rooftops along the street, as if some extra sense had warned him of her whereabouts. She had ducked behind the parapet, breathless, trembling. Her hands had begun to shake, and she felt a scream building up in her lungs that she could not allow into her throat.
Time passed.
She looked out.
Relemar the Hunter with the Fourth Division of the naoli occupation forces, was still there, standing in his dark clothes—the only naoli she had ever seen dressed— and watched, listened, felt the darkened buildings for her presence.
Then he moved, crossing toward the department store. . . . Deep scream, lovely scream, wanting out . . .
At the last minute, he veered from his projected path and went into the building next door.
She breathed out, swallowed the scream, digested it. Then she moved fast, down through the department store, into the street and away before he could return.
Now, in the foundry yard, she slipped from hulk to hulk until she reached the thousand-gallon storage tank in which she now made her home. She went to the end, pulled open the entry plate as gently as possible (it squeaked; Relemar the Hunter listened for squeaks) and went inside, deposited her burlap sack of food on the metal floor. She had found a rare little grocery that dealt in specially still packaged foods—of all things! She was not partial to such exotic, weird items for her menu, but it was all she could find. With the destruction of the city generators, the dial-kitchens no longer functioned.
Behind her, farther back in the single room of the hollow tank, there was a scraping noise.
Rats, she thought. They found their way in through the entry plate which had no lock, of course—and which would have been sealed had the tank ever been completed. Rats did not bother her as much as they once would have. She would have run screaming only a year ago. Now she had learned how to beat them, how to avoid their lunges. Not the mutated kind, of course. Just the friendly little earth normal breeds. She had not seen a mutated rat since shortly after the fall of the city.
She bent and found the glow lamp next to the entrance, fumbled with it in the utter pitch.
The tank brightened to a warm yellow.
She turned to locate the rat, choked, and dropped the glow lamp. It fell to the floor, making shadows dance on the walls, was still, unbroken.
"Hello," said Relemar the Hunter.
He walked slowly forward from the rear of the room.
He was smiling. Or trying to.
This time, she did not suppress the scream . . .
It was ninety-four minutes before dawn of that day.
David stood in the center of the book shop, looking around at the hundreds of cartridges. Now and then, he withdrew one from its rack and looked at the tide and author. If he was intrigued, he would put the earpiece in his good right ear and touch the tab for a summation of the volume and a few critical comments. If it sounded good, he dropped it in the plastic bag he carried and went on, looking for something to balance what he had just selected. If he had just taken a cartridge of poetry, he made certain his next acquisition was a novel of sheer adventure. Then something in the nonfiction line. Then something humorous. Then a heavy novel.
He was delighted. Here was all the art he wanted—for nothing. That had always been the problem with art before: it had cost. And he had not had enough to spend on it. No matter how much he earned or what he scrimped from other necessities, he could not buy all he wanted. Now the cartridges were free for the taking. Who was to stop him? Certainly not the owner. The naoli had finished him off long ago, had disposed of his corpse in a sanitary fashion. The naoli were quite fastidious.
When he had gathered all he needed—which was all that interested him—he slung the heavy bag over his shoulder and went into the street. He moved quickly to the alleys and the walkways between the building mazes which were ideal for secretive travel now that their lights did not burn and their police monitor eyes did not see. He wound through the great city, breathing in the cold air, enjoying the specters of his frosted breath, until he arrived at the train yards.
Bluebolt stood on the side track where he had left her, long and shiny, as magnificent as ever. He stood in the yard, admiring her lines and speculating dreamily on the journey ahead. What better way to cross the continent? A luxurious form of travel he could never have afforded. Bluebolt was a private train—or had been before the war —and would have cost several million to construct.
He climbed up the stairs, palmed open the door into the engineer's cabin. The lights of the computer board winked softly blue and green. He took his books through into the second car, which was the living room, deposited the bag of them beside a luxurious simulated leather chair. Stacked other places in the room were the other provisions he would need.
He nodded with approval, smiled, and went back to the cabin, whistling. He slipped into the comfortable command chair before the thick plexiglas window and took a moment to enjoy the silent power of the great engine.
If the handiwork of man had all been as smooth and pure as, the Bluebolt, Earth never would have
fallen. She would not have deserved to fall. He looked out the window again at the dark yard and the glimpses of the captured city that he could see. It all looked shabby and corrupt next to Bluebolt. It was the creation of Man the Capitalist.
Capitalism was fine. As long as man used it. But when the system had become so big that it guided the destiny of society rather than society regulating it, then capitalism had become dangerous. The interest of capitalism rampant had led to the serious air pollution crisis decades ago. It had led to the population crisis too (more babies meant more buyers). It had ground out plastic, imitation streets and cities like this one. In the early days of war, no attempt had been made to find out why the naoli wanted to fight, because a war used products. Selling products was the name of the game. When it was obvious the naoli were winning, there was too much hatred to start the talks that should have been initiated immediately. So the senseless war had been waged—and lost deservedly.
Bluebolt was a capitalist's toy, which proved the system could produce quality. But the man who had built this had been a rare bird indeed: in command of his money instead of a servant to it.
David swung the programming board around and looked at the typewriter keys. He thought for a moment, then punched out:
CALIFORNIA. SHORTEST ROUTE.
The computer gurgled, buzzed, and chimed three times. It said: "Destination acknowledged. Route established. Proceeding on command."
He typed:
PROCEED.
Laboriously, the Bluebolt built speed, pulling out of the darkened yards, faster and faster, until it was barreling past the empty city, moving quietly on polished rails and its almost frictionless, rollamite processed wheels. David fought an urge to pull the silver cord of the train whistle. He wished to make as unspectacular a departure as possible.
Eventually, he was torn between two desires. He wanted to watch the landscape flash by, wanted to see the dawn from his command chair. Yet he felt like some time with a cartridge. At last, he went back and brought an adventure novel up front to plug in his ear. The sound and the visions came—the sound deep in his ear, the visions behind his eyeballs. Whenever he could no longer contain himself, he stopped the sound and the pictures and watched the Bluebolt gobble rails toward California and the Haven . . .